Charbonneau:
Kay, what is your current occupation? Are you in an academic program?
Are you employed? Are you finishing a research program? What is your
status?
McMonigal:
I am employed as a postdoc.
Charbonneau:
What university are you enrolled with for your postdoc program?
McMonigal:
North Carolina State University. In the marine Earth and atmospheric
sciences department.
Charbonneau:
How far along are you in this program?
McMonigal:
I started in December of 2020, so I am a little over a year and a half
through. It has three years of funding originally, although I have
another year of funding while I was here, so I have two and a half more
years to go potentially.
Charbonneau:
When you when you started it in December how long was your work online
for before you returned to in person courses or research?
McMonigal:
I did not have an office for the first seven months, eight months. I did
not do anything in person until I want to say July 2021.
Charbonneau:
For your research, how much la materials did you need to use versus the
types of things you could do online, like peer review and lit review?
McMonigal:
I do not do any like lab work in this post doc. It is all modeling.
Drafting papers or that type of thing. I do not really need to be in
person for anything.
Charbonneau:
What is your ratio of how often do you go on campus versus working at
home?
McMonigal:
I go on campus four days a week and then I work from home one day a
week. I am teaching a course at Duke starting in like 2 weeks, but so
far, I have not been teaching now.
Charbonneau:
What course are going to be teaching at Duke?
McMonigal:
It is called “The Climate System.”
Charbonneau:
For your research, who funds it, and what is the reasoning for it?
McMonigal:
It is funded by the NSF. It is looking at the dynamics that drive
variability, trends, and sea surface temperature. Large scale climate
change is what is motivating all of it.
Charbonneau:
What have you notice have been the pandemic related requirements that
were in place for you while you were conducting your work and research?
McMonigal:
I am trying to remember at some point it was a required to wear masks
anywhere in the building. I think anywhere inside on campus. There were
never meetings that I knew of. People were not meeting in person, but I
do not think that was dictated by the university.
I do not think that there were travel-related rules for certain
countries. There were not rules like: “You cannot travel at all for
work,” type of rules. I think for students you had to get a COVID test
before the beginning of the semester, but as an employee, I do not think
I ever had to do that.
Not a lot of requirements, and now there is nothing. You do not have to
wear a mask on campus under any situation and there can be big meetings.
In our department, we have not really gone back to having anything in
person. There are still not seminars in person or anything. But as far
as like rules about it, we could be having them in person.
Charbonneau:
Did you run into any impacts where you had pieces delayed for you, wait
on something to get back to
McMonigal:
During my postdoc there have not really been hiccups. I was finishing my
PhD during the pandemic and there were some issues with that. There was
a cruise I was planning to go on that just got totally cancelled. Our
research cruise never happened.
When I was finishing my PhD at big problem was Wi-Fi. Having good enough
Wi-Fi to do my research. But in my post doc that has not been a problem.
I defended my PhD in June of 2020. At that point I did not have a job.
My PhD advisor was planning to employ me as a postdoc for six months
while I found a job. But there was a hiring freeze at the university, so
she could not do that because I was counted as a new hire. So, in the
end, I just delayed turning in my dissertation and continued to be paid
as a student through December of 2020 because it was the only way I
could continue to be employed. I technically graduated in December of
2020.
Charbonneau:
Did your outlook on your research and career change during the pandemic?
McMonigal:
I feel like it is broadened because related to the pandemic I applied to
post docs that involved a lot more modeling than I had originally
planned. The post doc I am in now is all modeling-based and there is no
need to go out into the field or go to see or anything.
I like that a lot more than I expected I would. Originally, I was not
going to apply to those kinds of jobs. Moving forward, my research
program plans combine both modeling and observations. It did not totally
change the things that I am focused on, but it gave me a broader
perspective on things that might be interested in.
Charbonneau:
Just to elaborate, what are the models you are making? What platform or
program are you using to make those models?
McMonigal:
They are mostly coupled climate models. The type of models in the IPCC
report. I run them on a supercomputer.
Charbonneau:
What is your plan for how you want to apply this experience towards your
career?
McMonigal:
I have been applying to more permanent positions, mostly in academia,
like tenure track faculty jobs. On occasion I am also applying to a few
jobs in the climate startup subfield. Many groups do data analysis to
then give cities reports on their climate vulnerabilities. The industry
side of things. But I would say still using the skills I have from my
degree.
Charbonneau:
From what you have seen in your experience working remotely and on
models is that going to be a thing that is more of a permanent change in
your field? Will you always use those models now that you have been
exposed to them.
McMonigal:
I do not know for sure, but I at least want to have it as a choice.
Having learned the skills of how to do it and meeting a lot of the
people who are experts in the models, gives me more options for
collaborations into the future, or how I envision it as combining both.
So, in a specific region, doing seagoing work and collecting
observations, but then using models to fill in the things we could not
get from going to sea. So, I think I kind of I really see both.
Charbonneau:
Do you think you will continue to do sea travel for your work?
McMonigal:
That is a good question. I think I do not know yet. In my post doc, I do
not have any funding to do any of that type of stuff. It has been
permanent over these few years. If I get a job where I can give my own
grants, it is something I would want to do. I do not know that I would
ever do quite as much before. I was doing like 100% like sea-going
observation stuff. Now I am doing 100% modeling and I would like it to
be not 50/50, but like 60/40. I do not imagine I would go all the way
back to as much as I used to be
Charbonneau:
What did not get changed or altered for you during the pandemic?
McMonigal:
What was not altered for me is I really feel like I work best and enjoy
it the best if I work mostly 9 to 5 and then do not do anything past
then, which was hard in the beginning of the pandemic. You are home all
the time, and you work at home. But I tried to enforce that and set
hours that I was at work even when I was doing it from home. Mostly I
did decent at it.
I am trying to think if there is anything else. I do not feel my
productivity changed a huge amount, which I know for some people was a
substantial change.
Charbonneau:
Were there any other strategies you had to implement besides shifting
your research? It seems like that was the major strategy you used to
overcome your biggest obstacle. I do not know if there are any other
obstacles that you can recall.
McMonigal:
Yes, that was the biggest one. The other one, which was a big problem at
the time, but long term, not really a problem, was just my Wi-Fi was
terrible originally. Getting moving and then getting a better Wi-Fi plan
was something very practical. That helped. guess like the obvious things
too, like having meetings on Zoom and all of that. Something nice out of
that was a lot of my collaborators are much older, like close to
emeritus level, or not emeritus, and they used to have no knowledge of
how something like Skype worked and they all kind of had to figure it
out. I feel like now it is nice, even I can meet via Zoom with people
that like had no concept of how to use those things three years ago. We
do not have to be in the same city or anything.
Charbonneau:
Something I would like to touch back on is you mentioned your
productivity was the same and you just had to like to get used to
setting yourself a schedule from like 9 to 5 at home. Because you use
resources such as the supercomputer and whatnot, were there some
resources that you needed that were not as easily accessible?
McMonigal:
No, I can do that from my laptop. It really like was not an issue. Yes,
mostly not an issue.
Charbonneau:
What is the background of the people you work with?
McMonigal:
It is widely varying, so there are three students in the research group
I am in, so I work with graduate students. A lot of faculties of all
levels in the department that I work with. There are not very many
postdocs. There are five postdocs and one of them is my wife. It also
means there is not really a ton of people to make friends with,
especially when a lot of people are working at home.
Charbonneau:
Did you notice any changes in staffing levels due to the pandemic?
McMonigal:
They have hired a ton of people. I do not know if that has anything to
do with COVID or not, but I think they have hired 7 new faculty members
in the past three years. In my department there is only 30 faculty
total. So that is a massive increase. One or two people retired, but it
is mostly an increase. A lot of those new faculty members also have
postdocs or graduate students, so there are just more people total.
Charbonneau:
Have you noticed that any of the people you work with have any missing
skill or social gaps from the pandemic?
McMonigal:
Both myself and people I work with have a lot of answers to this. For
myself mostly, I feel like I am sure I can pick these things back up,
but like my social skills have gotten rusty. I have noticed as I have
gone to a few conferences in person recently.
I moved to a new city during the pandemic and no one’s really doing
anything. I have not made friends. I feel like just talking to new
people is not something I do very much. Then you have the awkwardness
too of do we shake hands? Are people cool with that? I do not know. I
feel like for myself it is trying to brush up on talking to people,
networking, and that type of thing.
For colleagues, is hard to say, but I feel like there are students
struggling a lot more with communicating their research to a broader
audience. I think is just something people struggle with. But I feel
like there were some students, some postdocs, and people at all levels
who stopped talking to anyone except for their work colleagues during
the pandemic. They have forgotten that you must give people the big
picture and not everybody knows exactly what you are doing. I feel like
when I go to conferences and things, the quality of the presentations
has declined.
Charbonneau:
Have you seen like the amount of work that is available for you
increase, decrease, stay the same?
McMonigal:
It has mostly stayed the same. There has not been a substantial change
for work.
Charbonneau:
What do you feel like are like the skills that you learned like in the
classroom that you use most, and you are like professional setting?
McMonigal:
The big one that for me is since I am doing climate change related
things just the general knowledge of how the climate system works and
that type of thing. Some of the more communication type skills too as
far as talking to people about climate change. Then on the very
technical side, especially now with the modeling work that I am doing,
some of the computer science type classes that I have taken up. Things
like Python mostly, have become helpful.
I took a computer science class my first year of undergraduate and I
thought it was so useless. I did not use it for 10 years, but now I use
it, so I am glad I did.
Charbonneau:
What new opportunities became available to you due to the pandemic?
McMonigal:
I think a big one is like being willing to meet with collaborators via
Zoom, even if they are somewhere else. I used to only collaborate with
people I could meet up with in person.
Now it is normal, I would say at least once a week I have a zoom meeting
with people in Colorado, Hawaii, or Florida. I think people have become
more aware that that is something you can do. It obviously existed as a
possibility before the pandemic, but it has become more of a thing.
I have also been able to go to more conferences since some of them have
virtual options. I do not know that I always get as much out of a
virtual conference compared to in-person, but I have been able to go to
a few conferences either like for free or just for like a few $100
because they were virtual. If you have a limited conference budget, that
means I get to go to more things as compared to having to spend a ton of
money to travel to in person conferences.
Charbonneau:
What is a piece of advice you would give yourself or your biggest
takeaway from your pandemic experience?
McMonigal:
I feel like mostly just trying to relax and be OK with change. In the
beginning of the pandemic, I found it hard. I think everyone did.
Everything was changing and you have no idea like what is going on or
what the future is going to be. Try to just take a deep breath and, do
the best you can every day rather than panic about what is going to
happen.
